Somoa Moves West

Not really, but they are moving the date line. They are skipping a day this week so they can move to the other side. They are doing this because they trade primarily with Australia and New Zealand.

This is similar to my problem with time zones. The dates and times are meaningless. If your country is trading so much with countries that have a slightly different schedule, then you can adjust. Who declared that Saturday and Sunday are the weekend? If you need to adjust and make Monday and Tuesday the weekend, what is the difference?

Besides that rant, I find this really interesting that a county (or territory, whatever Samoa is) realized there was a problem and agreed to skip a day on the calendar. So much fun information in the article …

Hotel guests won’t have to pay for an extra night, but employers will be required to pay workers for Friday. “For the business community, it’s very difficult,” Lesa said, “They’ll be paying for a day that doesn’t exist.”

As for folks born on Dec. 30 … well, this year they’re in the same boat as Feb. 29 birthday babies.

Two years ago, drivers were ordered to switch from right-side to left-side driving â€” to reduce the cost of converting cars brought in from Australia and New Zealand.

It’s also not the first time Samoa has switched sides on the calendar: Back in 1892, Samoans gained an extra day when they went from the west side of the imaginary Date Line to the east side. The king made the switch to please U.S. traders â€” and to celebrate, he gave his subjects a double dose of the Fourth of July that year.

Cool move by the King on that last one. If you are going to do this, have fun with it. They should have skipped a Friday that fell on the 13th.